


(Everyone's a Little) Fucked Up

by skylinesunflowers



Category: That '70s Show
Genre: American History, Everyone Has Issues, Monologue, Neglect, Serious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:40:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26258083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skylinesunflowers/pseuds/skylinesunflowers
Summary: We know Hyde and Jackie have issues, and that Kelso has a fairly normal (though huge) family. But what about Eric, Donna, and Fez?
Kudos: 9





	1. Eric

Yeah, okay, admittedly, Eric doesn't have the worst family out of the lot. His dad's not a deadbeat, his mom is loving, and his bitchy sister isn't the worst she could be. He probably has the most normal family: parents still married and a rivalry with a sibling.

So, it's a little awkward when Hyde, Jackie, or Donna start on their deadbeat families, because he can't relate. Hell, he'd go as far as to say that Kelso and Fez couldn't either.

But, the fact remains, he still can, in a way. Disappointing his father, whether it be his grades, which, miraculously, aren't drowning this semester, his lack of manliness, or his absolute hopelessness at sports. Red wanted a son who could play for the Packers, who would smash someone for even questioning his manhood. An intelligent guy, who did well with women that were up to his caliber.

Instead, he got a scrawny nerd of a son. The thought leaves a bitter taste in Eric's mouth.

It gets fucking worse. The kids at school pick up on it. So do Hyde and Kelso, Jackie and Donna, but they keep their taunts to the basement. For all her bitchiness, Jackie would speak up in that shrill voice if one of her cheerleader friends ever said a word against him. Why, Eric had no clue, but his hatred for her was soured by gratitude.

Eric still chases Red's approval, just a little. No longer in the worshipful way he did as a child, like an unwanted beagle who was kicked, but still. He tries to put in effort at school, takes up running to gain strength, and pretends like he cares when Red gives him a sermon on how to build a proper chair.

It's never enough.

Kitty doesn't get enough credit for being a nurse and a mother to seven. On any given day, she'll have four people in the house for dinner, and she just comes home and cooks, without losing her smile. How, Eric will never know. After Career Day, he tries to express his gratitude more often.

He doubts it makes a difference, but, whatever.

Hyde is like the son Red never had. He's like the brother Eric never had, either, and he prefers his brother to his sister. Sometimes, though, Laurie can be understanding. Rare, rare occasions, that he loves his sister for.

You never do stop loving your family, Eric thinks. And, despite Red's "tough love", Kitty's smoking problem and menopause, and Laurie's sluttiness, he loves them. He won't say that he _loves_ Hyde, but he's cool.

He loves Donna, yeah. Donna's pretty much his family. They find their way back to each other, like magnets through a sheet of paper. He's known her for so long, and she knows him. She knows not to say anything when Red's run him down and he's having a bad week. Donna just sits beside him, holds his hand, and shuts up like no one else ever does.

Not that he wants her to shut up. That would be un-feminist of him, and he likes to take an interest in the things she likes. After all, she did sit through at least five screenings of _Star Wars_ with him.

She's not Kitty. She'll never be "Mrs Forman", or stay at home with the kids. Eric used to mind that, but he doesn't so much anymore. Donna will do big things, and he only hopes he's there when she does. He's lost her twice now, and he can't go through that again.

Donna loves him, too. She wouldn't go around beating up guys who made fun of Eric if she didn't. That's got to be what, almost three suspensions? Bob gets pissed off, but Donna cajoles him into coming around. He's more receptive to her after Midge's disappearance.

And, God, everyone tells him he doesn't deserve her. Hyde, Kelso, Jackie. Even Fez, once, when he was sex-deprived and hungry. Red, Kitty, practically everyone but her and Grandma Bea. Donna always tells him not to pay any attention to them. He does, but he doesn't advertise it. God only knows what Red would say.

That's the crux of the matter, isn't it? That he made Red bald and Red made him skinny. They would keep blaming each other forever. A relationship that could't be saved.

They'd end up like Kitty and Bea. He would bring Donna and their kids to come and visit, and he and Red would fight and fight, and pretend like everything was fine.

Eric thanks his lucky stars that he doesn't have a family like Hyde's, and that at least he has Kitty, who's perfectly normal, and at least he has Donna, who's the best thing about being who he is. And, goddamn it, maybe his father won't ever be happy with who he is, and he'll never measure up to his flunkie of a sister, but at least he has them.

How Laurie got to be the favorite, he'll never know. Kitty says Red fell in love with her eyes. Apparently, not with Eric's.

Maybe it's inevitable. Maybe he'll have a son, and turn into Red, and go bald, and have anger issues. At least he won't lose Donna, if that's the way it'll go. Fine, whatever.

At least his father isn't a deadbeat, or in prison. At least he doesn't wander around the house in an open robe. At least he isn't a drunk, who only ever writes to hit his kid up for money.

Red may not be the best father. Hell, he may not even be a good father. But, if, at the end of the day, Eric can get just one word of praise from him, he becomes better than Bud Hyde and Jack Burkhart.

So, yeah, Eric's family is a little fucked up. At least it's not the worst it could be.


	2. Fez

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Damn, I miss RBG already.

Americans are truly the worst. If he could do it all over again, knowing what he did now, Fez wasn't at all sure that he would choose to come here.

He has his friends, yes, but he has enemies. People who've never met him, who _he's_ never met. They hate him because he's brown, and it takes a lot of getting used to.

Nina's parents. Half the kids at school. All his friends, and all their parents. Even his host parents, Rebecca and Matthew, who think that his "Pagan" religion will be the death of them all.

Are his friends even his friends? Maybe it’s just what they’ve learned, but Jackie can be as bad as some of the others. Donna, Eric, and Hyde are much better, and Kelso is different. He’s always there for Fez when the racists come, but he can make a few comments here and there that rub Fez the wrong way.

There’s Rhonda, and aren’t they a pair? He misses her. They could be perfect together, as perfect as this country allowed for a foreigner and a girl who was overweight. He doesn’t know why Nina ever came into the picture, or why he painted Rhonda out.

And, then, he marries Laurie, and he doesn’t know whether it’s good or bad. Red, his new father-in-law, hates him, and Kitty’s gone insane. He finds himself wondering why he even stays.

Maybe it’s because, when the marriage is inevitably annulled, he knows something will happen. Maybe he just decides he has nowhere else to go. Either way, he finds Jackie in his arms one day, and stops searching for a reason.

Because, it turns out, Jackie can be vulnerable, and nice, and friendly. She can stop treating him like an outsider if he asks, and try to accept Fez for who he is.

And, son of a bitch, he’s twenty, been married once already, and he thinks he’s on top of the world. He watches while everyone else grows into themselves and wonders why he hated America so much in the first place.

Going out into the streets, he remembers. It’s not easy to forget in the real world.

His future father-in-law, Jack Burkhart, probably hates him. He knows that Jackie’s attitude towards foreigners must stem from somewhere, and that somewhere is probably her parents. (When Jackie asks him to, he tries his hardest to stop looking at Pam Burkhart.)

He has a love-hate relationship with this country, but still takes an interest in its politics. He watches Donna, whose eyes glow as she tells them about Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the first female judge on the Supreme Court. Jackie turns up her nose, but Fez can’t find it in himself to do the same. They aren’t dating yet, and this is a win for people like him. The underdogs.

He doesn’t verbalize this, though. No need to give anyone in this damn country more fodder to make fun of him.

Fez doesn’t think about America as a whole very often. He can’t stand his host parents’ blatant nationalism, because that’s what it is at this point. But he doesn’t associate those things with America until he’s really stoned, on a sugar high, or in the throes of post-sex brain.

The next time he thinks about America, he’s high in his house with Jackie, giggling away beside him. He has a love-hate relationship with this country, one that provided him with his wife, friends, and a quality education. One that kicked him when he was down, and traumatized him. All because of a color he couldn’t control.

Well, Fez thinks, he can be proud of his brown skin and of his white country.


	3. Donna

After Steven, Donna is probably the one with the worst family. Her and Jackie tie, she guesses.

It’s not that her parents aren’t loving, because they are. It’s just that her mother’s clueless, and her dad can be an idiot, and she can’t deal with their shit sometimes.

Eric’s a big help. He makes fun of Bob’s perm, teases her about Midge, and really, truly listens. She appreciates it. She loves him.

Because, God, her family’s a mess. Mom’s in California doing who knows what, and Dad’s here, wallowing in depression and joy. He’s manic, and then he isn’t.

She liked Joanne, yeah. Joanne was a much smarter version of Midge, one that she could look up to as a feminist herself. Then, Joanne was gone and Donna was left mourning another almost- mother figure.

God, Donna just wants to leave this town behind sometimes. Just run away with Eric and pretend like she never lived here. A phone call here and there to Hyde, and that was the end of it. Donna could be a big New York City hotshot.

But, at this point, she has to be the voice of reason. The one to talk Bob down from the craziest of his ideas, and the one who calls Midge every weekend and asks about her new boyfriend, an up-and-comer at some new business down in California.

She feels like a parent, which is why she won’t have kids. Donna knows that Eric wants the classic Suburban family - two kids, a dog, and a white picket fence. She wants an apartment in a big city and a career in law, or news, or _something_ worthwhile.

She starts putting up posters of Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sandra Day O’Connor in her room, and ignores Jackie when she comes over and comments on their looks. She ignores Jackie a lot, now. It’s hard to be friends with someone who keeps putting you down.

Hyde gets it, a little bit, but he still doesn’t. She’s better off than he is. At least she can still call up her mother and talk to her, and gets to yell at her dad when he walks around in his open robe. He doesn’t, which is why it’s easier for her.

The thing is, Donna’s come to depend on Eric. It’s honestly kind of terrifying. Whatever. It’s a thing now. She doesn’t have the mental capacity to deal with that whole thing right now.

Donna sighs and puts her head down on the desk. She hasn’t written a word in her diary since she got it out. Too tired thinking about her crumbled family.


End file.
